Search

A while back I blogged about the ‘toilet van’ that is regularly parked across a pavement near where I live. The latest arrival is a burger trailer which now appears to have taken up permanent residence half on/half off a pavement on a road close to a local shop which is used by over 1,000 pedestrians a day during term-time. I wrote to the local police a few weeks ago asking them to do something about this, and to various other very badly parked vehicles with no response – and the trailer is still there. In case anyone is interested, authorities have the power to remove “any structure [that] has been erected or set up on a highway“, including “any machine, pump, post or other object of such a nature as to be capable of causing obstruction notwithstanding that it is on wheels”.(Highways Act 1980 Section 143)

Pedestrians are discriminated against

"In contrast to the changes made to every town and city to ease motor transport, walking has been made ever more unpleasant. Pedestrians have been treated with contempt. In a myriad of ways when we walk we are treated with less respect than when we drive". (quote for a cross-party parliamentary select committee report on walking in towns from 2001).

This blog documents how this discrimination works, what laws underpin it and what people are doing to counter it. Please take action and share your experiences in the comments section, on twitter or join our facebook group. Add photos to the Flickr pool. All photographs cc-by-sa 3.0 unless otherwise stated or obvious from the source.